


Scars

by demonsonthemoon



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types
Genre: Character Study, Gen, I'm Sorry, Trans Character, Trans Edward Elric, trans trauma porn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-04
Updated: 2018-11-04
Packaged: 2019-08-18 17:25:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,005
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16521467
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/demonsonthemoon/pseuds/demonsonthemoon
Summary: Edward Elric has more scars than he wants you to think about. More scars than he wants to think about himself, but he doesn't really have a choice in the matter, most days.CONTENT WARNING:The trans trauma tag is there because this is one of those fics that masquerades as a character study but is really just an excuse to share my trans headcanons and talk about trauma. It's one of those fics that you hate because they're the only ones in the trans tag but you still read them because they're the only ones in the trans tag. I'm sorry.





	Scars

Edward Elric has more scars than he wants you to think about. More scars than he wants to think about himself, but _he_ doesn't really have a choice in the matter, most days.

 

The ones most people know about, the most obvious ones, are the automail scars. And even then, a lot of people can't even fathom the extend of them.

Ed guesses a lot of people have a very vague idea of what losing a limb means. They imagine a stump as a clean slab of flesh hanging off one's body. They don't realize what that stump implies, what it means for a limb to be torn off, sawed away, crushed and destroyed. They can't begin to imagine what it feels like to have one's skin gape open, one's muscles sliced into, to feel one's bones crumble. Those people don't know _shit_.

And Ed hasn't fared the worst. Far from that. His arm and leg were torn off, but – small blessing – at least the fucked up dimension behind the door meant it happened cleanly. They weren't shredded off bit by bit. They were there, then they weren't. But even that leaves scars.

And then there's the automail itself. The thing sure _looks_ clean when it's on. Winry is amazing at what she does, and so the metal limbs seem to grow organically out of his skin, but it's all a lie.

The prosthetic has to be linked to his nervous system, which means it can't just slot over his shoulder. It has to go _in_. Into the mess of scar tissue and flesh where the wound had first healed.

It figures that losing something happens so easily. But gaining things is usually messy, slow, and excruciatingly painful. _Equivalent fucking exchange_ , Ed guesses.

Ed has lost an arm and a leg, and then he had gained new ones, and he had scars for every screw and rivet, for every wire connected however indirectly to his brain.

Most people don't think about all of that, and if he was a better peson, Ed would be _fucking happy_ for them.

 

He has other scars, with other stories. Most people don't know about those.

He has one on his left elbow from a bad fall when playing with Al in Resembool. He had slipped when running by the river and scraped his arm on some rocks. Alphonse had screamed and cried. It had all seemed very dramatic they day it happened, although now Ed thinks of the memory fondly. It brings back the image of his mother teaching them how to clean a wound and then holding him and his brother in a tight hug. When he thinks about it, Ed can almost imagine he remembers the smell of her hair.

 

He has a knife scar on his side. There's not much of a story to tell when it comes to that one. It's pretty much what people expect from him. He got in a fight, and then he wasn't careful enough and the other guy gave him a souvenir to remember why he should.

(Of course there was a longer version to that story. It involved someone almost falling to their death and Ed feeling like it would be better to have them in prison than buried, and that one thought almost costing him his life. Kindness is dangerous in this world, and Edward knows that better than most, but he's learned to be even more dangerous than kindness itself.)

 

And then there are the scars on his chest. Ed doesn't usually let people come close enough to notice, but those are far cleaner than the other ones. So much so one might call them unnaturally clean. And if one did so, one might start asking inappropriate questions.

Those scars are the ones Edward resents the most.

Not because of what they stand for. Not really.

He used to have breasts, big fucking deal. That was never really Ed's problem. Or at least it wasn't anywhere near the root of it. He had been fine with the fact that he had breasts. A little bit freaked out when they had started growing, sure. Especially because he'd been precocious. But he had been fine with them. They were just pieces of fat attached to his body, like so many other parts of him.

What he hadn't been fine with were the things those breasts seemed to imply about him. What he hadn't been fine with was being called a girl, a young lady, Alphonse's sister. He had avoided it for what little childhood he'd had, because mom and Al and Winry and Granny Pinako all called him what he wanted, and he always wore his hair short and never put on dresses, so most people just _assumed_ that he as a boy anyway, no questions asked.

But then his breasts started becoming noticeable. He could lower his voice all he wanted, but people took one look at the little nubs peeking out on his chest and they _got it wrong_. And then either Ed played along and pretended to be something he wasn't, or he got pissed and caused a scene and brought trouble to Al and their teacher, and despite that the people would keep on _getting it wrong_ , only on purpose this time.

All of that, Edward had a problem with. So that was why Izumi had offered to get him something to bind his breasts with, on the one condition that he never wore it during training.

Of course Ed had said yes. And soon, the binder had become a second skin to him. Admittedly, an uncomfortable, itchy one, but it was better than the alternative. Izumi's house was still a sanctuary where he was free to wear whatever he wanted and still be acknowledged for who he was. For that he was grateful.

Up until the moment where he left it behind.

The army was something else. The army meant paperworks that Edward had filled in in a not entirely legal manner, because there wasn't really any other way.

So Edward had started wearing his binder all of the time, physical training included, not wanting anyone to notice anything that could give them an excuse to kick the 12 year-old genius out of the army.

But of course someone had to notice at some point. Someone had to notice his shortness of breath after too physical a fight, they way he pulled at his clothing even if if was loose. Someone had to notice at least one of the thousand of clues Ed couldn't help but leave in his trail.

And of course that someone would be _Colonel fucking Mustang_.

And the Colonel had had one simple solution to what he felt was Edward's problem.

And that solution had been alchemy.

Specifically, highly-specialized medical alchemy. Of the kind that involved a lot of money and got put down under a fake name on the paperwork.

When he offered to have the surgery paid for by the military, Mustang was not expecting to receive a negative answer. This was supposed to be an offer you couldn't refuse.

Except Ed had said no. Categorically. He knew what happened when you tried to pretend the rules didn't apply to you, when you tried to play god. He knew what happened when you used alchemy to mess with human life. He had all the scars he needed to tell that story, _thank you very much_.

Mustang didn't understand that. He didn't understand that Ed didn't give a shit about how many people had been satisfied with a specific doctor's services.

Ed also didn't give a shit about how Mustang even knew about all of this. The only thing he cared about was the promise he'd made to Al and himself. They had made the mistake once. They weren't ever attempting human alchemy again.

And that oath had been all good and well in theory. But in practice things had been more complicated. Ed had turned fourteen and had started getting pain in his back on a regular basis, cursing the fact his chest had developed so early.

In practice, he couldn't bear to see Al so worried about his health, couldn't bear the few but cutting comments about how he was throwing his body away, even though he should know how lucky he was to have one.

(And Al only said that because he knew there was another option possible. He only said that because he knew there was a way for Ed to feel better, even if he had rejected it.) (And whatever people said, it wasn't just about principles. It was about not inflicting his pain on another human being. It was about not being the excuse another person needed to get a taste of power and want _more,_ and get punished for it. It was about not letting himself go through that hell again, because he didn't know if he would be able to look away from the abyss this time.)

Alphonse only said mean things to him if Ed needed to hear them.

So one day, Ed mustered up enough guts and stupidity to go knocking on Mustang's door and not puke all over his perfect uniform as soon as he opened the door. And when Ed asked him if the offer was still on the table, Mustang only made one tiny sarcastic joke, and it was about the money, and he was a gentleman about the rest of the whole fucking affair.

And so Ed found himself in a medical cabinet, having to face the fact that maybe a big part of his reluctance to do this was due to his unadulterated fear of losing any new part of his body. Hadn't he given enough? Would he even be able to recognize himself in the mirror if more of him went missing in this way? How much of yourself did you need to keep to be considered a human being?

But if he told himself it was too late to change his mind – even if that wasn't true, even if he still had a few minutes before they drugged him to alleviate the pain, even if Al would make all hell rain down on whoever tried to touch him if Ed just said a word – if he told himself it was too late, he might just manage to stick things out and get through this. And then no more binder, less back-ache, less skin irritation. No more wondering what someone would say if they found out.

Ed could breathe again, if he thought about it like that. And that was all he needed in order to nod to the doctor assistant that he could put him under, and then his thoughts were starting to slip from his grasp, and everything was much simpler like this, wasn't it?

Then he had woken up, still woozy and confused, and Al had been there to take his hand and tell him some stupid reassuring gibberish and that had felt so good Edward had almost cried. And of course he had blamed it all on the drugs, and Alphonse had indulged him even thought he knew damn well that his brother was a fucking sap and loved him so much it filled his entire world.

And when the drugs' effects had faded away, he had looked down at himself, at the gauze around his chest, and he had felt something hollow lodge in his throat. They were gone. They were just gone. And Ed was still here, still... whole somehow. He didn't actually feel like anything was missing, he was so used to the sight of an artificially flat chest. But he knew it was different now. Although nobody else would. Nobody but him and Al, and _Colonel fucking Mustang_ , for some reason. That wasn't something Ed wanted to think about. There were a lot of things related to Roy Mustang that Edward actively tried not to think about. It just made his life a lot easier.

**Author's Note:**

> Firs time posting for FMA! And it's with this shit. Oops. Hope you enjoyed it still <3
> 
> If you've got money to spare, you can buy me a coffee here: https://ko-fi.com/meenilevi


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